


We Were Meant To Be One

by orphan_account



Category: Doki Doki Literature Club! (Visual Novel), 僕のヒーローアカデミア | Boku no Hero Academia | My Hero Academia
Genre: Crossover Pairings, Crossovers & Fandom Fusions, F/M, Mind Manipulation, Suicide
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-04-03
Updated: 2019-04-03
Packaged: 2020-01-04 11:05:14
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,461
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18342392
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/orphan_account
Summary: If you were never really real, and something tangible came into your life, would you hold tighter or let go?Monika gets a quirk, meets a boy, and goes too far.





	We Were Meant To Be One

Reality manipulation.

Really, Monika’s quirk was a close guarded secret hidden in the gun safe of her own mind. Oh, her mother insisted, her quirk was object permanence. Things that were there appeared to be gone, and she had mischievously cleaned her room by making it appear clean to her mother, like holding a perfect photo in front of a camera lens. That quirk was safe enough, and Monika accepted that uselessness to be part of her function, her everyday life.

Her everyday life felt like a lie. There was disassociation in every footstep she took, signs hanging on shops written like they were in a language not her own, yet able to parse them all the same. As she grew up, she realized there was more to her object permanence than what met the eye. She could whisper things to her friends, and suddenly, the lie gained traction in their minds, even when confronted with the truth. Testing it even further, if she told herself there would be a soda waiting for her in the refrigerator and believed it like Peter Pan believed in his flying, sure enough, it would be there.

Her parents never bought soda.

When you could change reality’s fabric, reality felt a little less… real. As she grew up, the distance between her and the world grew. Aimless but for tapping the keys on a piano, even if she could hit a perfect note each time, music remained beautiful. Writing became a conversation between herself and the person she imagined who’d understand her. Poems and music notes flowed from her pen, an inky tether to the world. It was only in her own thinking that she found flaw, and that provided her with some comfort.

Of course, she’d never possessed dreams of becoming a hero. She was afraid of her own quirk and kept it a secret from her parents for fear of worrying them. Making them afraid of her. After all, everything she told them about being the perfect student was true, because she said it, and because the script of the world changed around her to fit snugly against her form.

Her perfect life was a constriction, closing tightly around her throat, changing the world into shapes and text and pixels. Was it a quirk or an illness? Research gave her nothing. She had no precedent in her family—none who’d ever told, anyway.

It was on a regular autumn afternoon that Monika’s reality changed itself.

Holding a sweet potato wrapped in a plastic wrapper, one bite was subpar, and with a little shift, it suddenly tasted amazing. The best she’d ever remembered. Holding her briefcase in one hand and listening to her own footsteps against the crowd’s, Monika’s life stopped and started in a single moment.

A man had grabbed her arm and said something lascivious as his friends crowded around her. She found herself moving a lot slower to get past them—a quirk that hindered someone’s movement? Disgusting. She could blink all these people away, but Monika had never used her power to take a life.

“Leave me alone,” Firm, unforgiving.

“What are you doing, walking home all by yourself?” The man called in a gravelly voice. “You need someone to escort you, don’t she?”

His friends laughed along with him, and before Monika could force her quirk to override theirs, a voice called out behind her.

“She said she wanted to be left alone.”

That _voice._

Oh, heavens, Monika couldn’t make a better voice if she recreated the entire world from scratch. Maybe it was just because someone had come to her rescue, or because he sounded close in age, but turning around to look at him, her heart would’ve stopped on the spot.

There he was, in living, breathing color. He stood out against the crowd in red and white, white like the color of her hair ribbon and red like blood, and it felt like Monika could breathe against the tight enclosure of her world of shapes and sound, void of oxygen. It didn’t matter that the men around her dispersed without a fight; clearly this one had a reputation. It didn’t matter if he just said ‘stay safe’ and walked past her without hardly noticing her.

She heard the voice she’d always hoped to hear from the other side of the curtain of the world and in an instant, she was addicted to it.

(But a lady had to play it cool.)

“Excuse me!” She jogged over, smiling brightly as she caught up to him. “That was very nice of you!”

“This isn’t usually the safest way home. What school do you go to?”

“… Yours. Haha. Sorry, we must miss each other in the halls.”

Monika’s uniform had changed, or rather, it always had been a UA uniform in his eyes—it wasn’t like he’d remember the gray blazer and orange vest on her just moments before.

“Taking the long way home, then.” He didn’t seem like much for conversation, but Monika _needed him to keep talking._

“You got it. This place has the best sweet potatoes, and I always stop for a snack.” How vapid she must sound, not enough… “I’m Monika. You are?”

“Todoroki Shoto.”

“Todoroki-san… well, I want you to know I appreciate what you did very much!”

“Mhm. I recognized those guys from before. Stay away from them.”

“Uh-huh…” Before she could get him to talk about anything else, he turned a corner and gave a small wave and a ‘bye’ over his shoulder.

Damn it. Her life was over. Beginning. All with a boy.

UA was prestigious enough that she could fold herself into its doors like origami. Not into his class—the one person who could take away her quirk was there, and she wanted to avoid meeting him as much as possible. Monika had never undone someone from reality before—and highly doubted that she could, even for convenience’s sake. Besides, it was unconscionable! She’d do fine in the business classes.

There was the trouble of losing her entourage, though. Natsuki, Yuri, and Sayori. She decided what was best for them and tucked them into UA’s halls as well. Did they have a literature club there? They did now.

Feeling around the script of the world and finding herself satisfied, Monika went to bed that night on a high of repeating his voice and writing down his name. If he was in focus, the world felt more unchangeable, more real. He was her ticket out of here.

\--

“Only three members, huh…”

Natsuki had been reorganizing her manga in the back of the classroom. Yuri was playing idly with her nails, possessing a quirk that made them grow sharp and long as knives at will. Sayori was literally glowing—able to emit UV light from any part of her body, her rosy cheeks were like beacons this morning. Everything felt new! Even if they’d been here for months, there was something to be excited over, somehow.

“Well, we’ll make it work!” Monika decided cheerfully, knowing that if she just bent reality for him to join her club, something would feel wrong. Like she’d be messing with something sacred. The world around him was fine, but Todoroki himself was not to be touched, goaded, or changed.

Besides, she’d… tried.

On that night when he was walking away, she urged him to turn around so she could see him one last time, and _reality had not changed to suit her_. Maybe he really was untouchable? Or she was in such a shock, she hadn’t tried hard enough? Maybe he was special and couldn’t be changed. If there was someone in this world Monika couldn’t predict or alter, they had to be some kind of soulmate. Someone with an innate immunity to her, someone who was real in a sea of text and ink.

It didn’t stop her from seeing him outside of class and handing him a flyer for the literature club. Insisting he come over for just a cupcake as her way of thanking him for the other day, he reservedly nodded and agreed. Monika’s eyes just settled onto him, taking in his form, how it solidified the ground for her before giving a cheerful ‘see you soon’! As soon as she turned away, the cement beneath her felt fluid again with how easily she could change it, but she was striding across it with the confidence of a club president.

The next day, she would be late to the literature club. A piano recital, making new friends in her school, things she didn’t want to bother with, but had to—for the sake of appearing normal.

She slid open the door and saw Sayori leaning over the desk Todoroki sat at, as they talked over a book. He was smiling. Something about how Sayori couldn’t hide her glow had made her bashful, and he found it endearing.

Monika froze at the door.

_Sayori is your friend, remember? She would do this to you, too. Don’t worry about it._

There was something very bitter about how he smiled at Sayori first and not her.

He would join the club, eventually. Something about their quiet club getting him out of the house seemed promising,  even just for reading. He even promised to bring friends, if they were interested—it seemed like such a small club, and it could use some growing.

It was then that Monika suddenly realized she knew nothing about him, and would be truly content with that, but wanted to know more. Poetry. The voice that she’d used to talk to herself, she could use to talk to him. He’d understand her. He _must._ She’s poked a hole in the wall and can finally see someone who could speak her language, hold her hand without feeling like it’d fade through in an instant. He wasn’t pixels and he wasn’t words, he was a human being.

More than she could say for her accessories, who were being as welcoming and gracious as they could be, even if it felt Monika herself was being pushed out of the conversation.

“Let’s all write a poem for tomorrow, okay?”

\--

God, if only there was some cure for the pounding unreality that throbbed in her head. The more time she spent around him, the more the world seemed to break apart into shapes that she couldn’t make out whenever he went away. He was a cure, well needed, that she wanted to keep close by. As the sun set in the classroom that Monika could feel tangible as she swept it up, she looked over at him and smiled, glad to have sent the rest of the literature club home.

“You know… I might be the only person who doesn’t know everything about you, here.”

Son of Endeavor, fire and ice quirk, a scar that gave Monika white hot rage whenever she thought about what might have caused it. She stalked him as much as she could online, but he put so little of himself out there that his real personality remained a mystery to her. Only leading his actions was his deeds, and those themselves were very impressive.

“There’s not much to say.”

A pause.

“And I could say the same for you,” He finally said.

An open opportunity to talk about herself? Monika fidgeted with a lock of her hair. What could she say. “I love music and writing, and my quirk is object permanence manipulation, and…” At the sound of her own voice, she couldn’t help but laugh. It was ridiculous, wasn’t it? Just listing off her likes and dislikes like that. That’s not how you knew a person. That’s not how she’d get to know him, either.

“Would you like to see my poem for tomorrow? I finished writing it.”

Rustling through her book bag, she pulled out the neat printer paper with words elegantly scribed onto it. He took it, eyes scanning down the page, obviously quick to read.

“… you feel trapped.” He said, quietly.

“R- really? You got that meaning from that poem alone?”

“A lot of metaphors about being outside, looking in… you seem so outgoing, is that a problem for you?”

“Well, ah…” She was being thoroughly read like a book and nothing was more thrilling. She was being understood! “I guess it’s a little complicated.”

How much could she reveal? “Do you have yours done?”

Wordlessly, he took out a notebook and flipped it open for her to look at. It was elegantly written, yet simple at the same time. It described a place and a feeling, a state of being caught in a single moment. She never pinned him for a poet, and yet the talent was there. No wonder he was able to read hers so succinctly.

“This… sounds like the kind of poem Sayori would like.” She said, quietly.

“Is Sayori depressed?”

That caught her off guard. Monika always knew Sayori’s act, but in a way, that had been her coping method to keep going. “She is, a bit. But she always keeps her chin up!”

“I thought this might cheer her up.” He turned to the window and looked out across the grand exterior of the school. “I’m going to show it to her tomorrow.”

“I see.”

For a moment, the eye had been peering back through the hole in the wall and they locked glances, but his gaze had turned towards Sayori again in an instant. Monika couldn’t let this keep happening.

\--

But it did.

As the months progressed, he would always take a seat next to Sayori, who was becoming brighter with every day. Almost blinding to look at, it seemed like her depression was starting to fade—or at the very least, found a comrade in Todoroki, and started getting up earlier every day to see him before school, before they had to go to their respective classes. They were complimentary—one was fire and the other, the sun itself. Monika had only grown more bitter as it continued. She’d never changed someone before, but quietly and slowly, one day, she fixated on Sayori and turned her brightness down, like twisting a dial. She excused herself to go home, knowing that she’d be in bed the moment she got there. Rule number one was that Todoroki could never, ever be touched or changed, so his concern was very real and Monika could only watch helplessly as he tried to pull her out of her rut.

Who was Sayori, anyway?

Monika was playing piano in the music room as she pondered that.

Sayori was an accessory. Proof Monika had some degree of popularity if she looked up to her. It was starting to dawn on her that Monika didn’t even consider her a person. She was easily shoved into any situation she needed her for.

Sayori wasn’t needed anymore.

Sayori could go away.

The thrum of her fingers on the keys became louder and louder before she realized she could be making a scene and toned it down. Sayori’s a problem? Easy. No more Sayori.

\--

The next day, when Sayori showed up for class, Monika kneeled next to her as the other students shared their poems. There were quite a few now, most of them Todoroki’s friends. It was easy to slip past them and speak quietly under her breath.

“Monika, I’m such a burden, I…”

“Yes,” She said, sweetly, fiddling with that mental dial again. “You are.”

Sayori looked up in shock, but it was so controlled as Monika rewrote her script and told her how to tie a certain knot, how the pain would be done and over with so quickly, how things would be better and how she would be beloved and missed instead of weighing everyone down. Everything looks better in hindsight, yeah? So would Sayori.

Without saying a word, Sayori packed her things and left.

\--

Monika could change reality, but she couldn’t predict it. Not that well.

She didn’t imagine Todoroki would go to Sayori’s home after school to see if she was okay.

She didn’t expect him to see her hanging by the noose.

So things had to be changed a bit.

It turned out that erasing Sayori would take her off his mind, as if she never existed at all. For a moment, Monika’s heart stopped, thinking he’d be traumatized by the sight.

The next day, things went back to normal.

\--

Monika feared no one more than Aizawa.

She never got in his way, never used her quirk around him, but the very instant he took it away from her, everything could come crashing down. She didn’t know if her reality could become undone the moment it was gone, or if it would shabbily hold up without her controlling it. She had to give no reason to suspect her of anything.

Was there any guilt? A little, but it was mostly because killing Sayori had been a waste. Now her group was down to two best friends, and she couldn’t help but regret that she had less back-up. Mourning, though? Monika was the only one who knew to mourn, and try as she might, looking in the mirror, she felt nothing. Her love felt stronger and a little terrifying. It braced her thickly, like it held more control over her than she had over the situation, and that’s the very reason Monika predicted that she might get caught. Emotions lead to sloppy work, but who could deny this love? She’d risk it all. So when she passed the teacher in the halls, all she offered was a smile.

She was elegant, prestigious, and tried very hard to be the kind of girl that fit together with Shoto, like a puzzle piece. Very quietly, she would change the world around him so that his attention couldn’t help but shift to her. She had to have a soft touch; so light that it would almost be seamless. Sayori’s absence felt like a chasm to Monika, but to everyone else, it seemed like the duo Yuri and Natsuki were natural cohorts to Monika.

The moment he started noticing her, the closer they became.

Eventually, they were the only two sharing poems. Monika’s practically telling all about her power in-between poetry too dense to make out except to someone who knew the secret. His were simple, but she noticed that even though Sayori was gone, it was still the kind she would have liked. His writing didn’t change for Monika at all.

So that was just who he was. It’s okay, she told herself, it’s okay. Sayori would just exist in the scratches of his pen and ink, and nothing more.

“Your poetry is simple, yet hits hard emotionally,” She said happily, reading his poem over again and again. This was him speaking back to her in the ways he couldn’t fully express, and she wished so badly to keep each one. “You’d do great as an author!”

“It’s just a hobby.”

Monika smiled sweetly, he was so humble! So cute!

“And it’s so obvious that you care about your friends, too. You mention sinking and hands reaching out for the subject of the poem. You’re very descriptive, but you use everyday words. I think you have a real gift.”

Todoroki paused. “Monika-san?”

“Yes?” Please, keep saying her name.

“What’s your quirk really like? Object permanence, I mean.”

For a moment, her heart sank. He knew. He knew, he knew, he knew, he knew—

“It’s just, in your poems, you talk about disassociation. Not directly, but it’s there. Does object permanence mess with you?”

Her façade didn’t crack at all, and she smiled. “Sometimes, I can’t keep track of what I’ve hid and what I’ve lost. It’s complicated… I’m embarrassed, but I can’t quite control it at times.”

“Hm.”

He read over her poem again.

“It sounds so much more… severe than that.”

He couldn’t think of her as ill or out of control, that wouldn’t fit her demeanor at all! She smiled, and knowingly hid her poem from him, even though he could still feel it between his fingers. He glanced up in surprise.

“I can’t say… more than what I’ve said.” She admitted finally.

“Why not?”

“Because it scares me.”

“Do you think you have a villain’s quirk?”

“Hahaha! Only the person using their quirk determines if it’s a villain’s or not. But sometimes…” She folded her hands in front of her, on the desk facing his. “I worry I might spirit away a person.”

“You can do that?”

“No no! I’ve never tried,” She lied, bluntly. “But what if I made someone invisible to themselves, and can’t find them? I’d never do that, but what if someone made me? It scares me, haha.”

He gave her the smallest of smiles. “Don’t worry about it. You wouldn’t do something like that.”

What was that stabbing pain? Did she have a conscience? She thought she deleted that with Sayori. No, it was simply because he was the one to say it. Anyone else, she’d just give a happy look and wave off.

“Aaahhh… I don’t talk about my quirk like this!” She covered her mouth playfully. “I try to push it to the back of my mind.”

“You could do a lot of good with it.”

“I’m in the business classes,” She shook her head. “I decided I don’t want to be a hero. I want something much more than that.”

“Money?”

“No, silly.”

She didn’t elaborate, either.

\--

Monika was being followed on the way out of the school.

It wasn’t a surprise who—another member who had joined the lit club, with fluffy green hair, wanted to stop her and say hello. Asked what they should be reading for the next day—she said whatever he wanted to bring in and share. Natsuki would love his comic books, if he wanted to share!

“Where’s Sayori? She hasn’t been to school in a while.”

Plot armor. In Monika’s very fictional world, the only one who escaped her bend of reality was the hero. Monika was self aware—she knew very well that killing a girl to twist someone into liking you made you a villain. This was as fated a meeting as the one with Todoroki—this would be the person to undo her if she slipped up.

“Sayori...” She looked sad, trailing off.

“What?”

“Midoriya-san, you can’t tell anyone about this.”

His voice became a little more worried. “What?”

“Sayori was a very depressed girl. She—”

“ _Was_?”

Monika looked down, sadly.

“She hung herself. Her parents want to keep it a secret. The staff already knows.”

“What?!” Already, tears brimmed in his eyes. “No! We can’t forget her or pretend she didn’t exist! She was a nice girl! Why didn’t you tell everyone?!”

Monika was starting to become annoyed.

“Because her parents’ wishes supersede my own.”

“That’s not fair! Everyone would want to pay tribute to her! We could…” He trailed off. “The last time I saw her, she was talking to you. What did she say?”

“That she wanted to go home and sleep.” Monika’s own crocodile tears welled up in her eyes. “And that’s been haunting me ever since she told me! So please…”

She wiped her tears off on the cuff of her jacket, mentally rearranging the world so that Sayori existed once more, but she had just disappeared, like he told her. Her anger at letting it happen was starting to build yet again. Phone calls would be made home. Sayori’s body would manifest in ashes that had since been interred. Sure, Todoroki would be sad. But he’d get over it, after all, the memories he’d made with Monika were real, right?

“Please…” Monika begged again.

“… I’m going to ask the teachers if we can have a… memorial, or something, it doesn’t seem right to let this pass over us. I’m sorry.”

“It’s okay.” She sniffed. “Sayori wouldn’t want us to forget her.” Though Monika desperately did.

\--

Her portrait hung in the literature club, with all manners of flowers surrounding it. Poems had been written and folded up next to it. Teachers gave warnings about suicide and what to do in Sayori’s shoes. Everyone mourned. Monika played the perfect part of the depressed best friend as she sulked in her own mind.

Todoroki seemed listless next to her. He’d been staring at the first poem Sayori ever gave to him, now recently re-manifested. Something about breakfast.

Monika sat next to him and put her hand over his, and he gently squeezed it back.

Elation filled her up like a balloon. Maybe Sayori was still helping, after all.

\--

Monika was now the villain, with a hero who could oppose her in her narrative. She had taken an innocent life and hadn’t given it back. She wasn’t guilty or upset, but the thought of being caught made her fake those feelings inside.

This is not Monika’s story, so she can’t win.

The next day, the mood of the class reflec

 

The next day, the mood of the class was a little brighter, though no one could really understand why.

Monika had taken her seat in the literature club, still pressing on despite her apparent loss. She’d gone to Sayori’s house and taken her poems from her desk, passing them around to anyone who’d want to read them. It was a sweet melancholy, and people began flocking to the literature club from notoriety alone.

In this, Monika could bury herself in a popular obscurity once again, being the rock that Todoroki leaned on with the loss of his new friend. Though he wasn’t too eager to lean on her—it was his other friend, the hero, that he would quietly whisper to as he read her poems out loud. Everything would’ve been so much better if the hero just—went away! Her quirk didn’t work on him, though, no matter what she tried and how hard she tried. While she could manipulate Todoroki a little, she made it a rule not to. Izuku was like a cement brick, immovable and unbreakable unless with brute force.

Things could proceed naturally from here, right? No more influencing the world around her. It pained her to break his heart, but she could set it right back together again, with a touch of kintsugi.

Their first date was unremarkable—a white dress, a café, poems from around the world and some exchange about their families. He had such remarkable shade for his father, she couldn’t help but love it. Monika, with all her talents, felt utterly unremarkable compared to him.

Back at the school, Izuku was thumbing through the pages of Sayori’s poems, noticing an odd pattern. As the dates went on, their subtle hints of depression had begun to fade. He’d heard about people becoming more secure once they chose a date to end their lives, but this didn’t add up. Sayori was a bright light next to Todoroki, it didn’t make any sense.

What was Monika’s quirk again? Object permanence… she made things disappear that were still really there.

What if that was the truth and a lie in one? What if she could cover things up, but at a much stronger capacity? No one talked about Sayori in the time she disappeared. It was as if she was just… gone.

So, theoretically speaking, Sayori hung herself, Monika covered it up, then uncovered it once someone had noticed. A theory was that she wasn’t focusing her power on him quite as much as the other students. Another was that he had an immunity, based on some factor of him, but what? Why would she want to cover up Sayori’s death?

She’s on a date right now, isn’t she?

…

Ah.

But no matter what, Monika couldn’t make Sayori kill herself, right? That’s not part of her quirk. Unless there was more to it.

Monika felt the script change around her. A threat.

Izuku packed his things and hurried out of the school, trying to remember which café they were at.

Monika excused herself from the table and began walking down the street, claiming to get some ice cream from a little shop down the way.

Izuku met her halfway down the street when everything around them stopped moving.

“Hi, hero!” She said, cheerfully.

“Monika, what did you do to Sayori?” His voice was cold, angry. He _knew_. Monika would have to think quickly on her feet.

“Nothing. She did that to herself.”

“What is this…?” The world glitching under the weight of her power, no one moved, no one blinked, no one breathed, and then there was nothing. Just an empty classroom with the two of them.

“Do you know what kind of reality this is?” She asked, softly. “It’s one where you’re always meant to win, no matter what. No matter how far you fall, you get up stronger. You’re the only one who’s so safe here to do that. Speaking strategically, you have quite an advantage over me.”

“Reality?”

“I’ve always had a feeling I was never quite real. In fact, ever since I was born, I don’t think I belong here. Isn’t that weird? Not belonging in the world you were born in. But Todoroki-kun is real. You are real. At least, you’re more real than I am. And since I exist between reality and nothing, I think I can change the script.”

This girl was _insane_ , but there was smoke where fire burned. Her quirk was manipulating reality itself? Did she manipulate Sayori to kill herself (yes) and then buried the body metaphorically out of everyone’s mind (of course)?

“I can bring Sayori back.” She said sweetly, innocently. “But I’d have to change her a little more.”

Izuku stared in utter shock. She could bring back the very person she killed just to get close to a boy? Where was her soul? Why hadn’t she yet?

“I can’t change you. I can’t change your memories or make you weak, but I _can change everything else about your world_. I can make your heroes forget you, I can make your own mother forget you. I can end this world, probably very easily.” Monika took a step forward. “Even now, you’re just like text on a screen to me. I can hardly see your face. There is only one thing I want. I exist solely to fulfill a purpose, and that purpose is love.”

“You’re crazy if you think I won’t tell everyone about what you really are!”

“Then I don’t need this world anymore.”

He froze. He couldn’t play hero if she could snap her fingers and bring the world to an end, but there had to be some limit, some weakness, even if he was the weakness!

“I’ll bring Sayori back,” She said, quietly. “I promise. I don’t want us to fight here and I don’t really want to leave Todoroki. He’s… a chance I actually have.”

“What’ll you do to Sayori? You said you’d have to change her.”

“I’ll just make her go to a different school.” She put her hands in the air, trying to diffuse him. “If she kills herself again, it won’t be because of me.”

“You’re a monster, you’re… just playing games!”

“Excuse you. I’m taking this very seriously. Even now, we’re nearing the end.”

“Don’t—Don’t let this end.”

She extended her hand to shake it.

“The world will go back to normal and only you’ll know. But do anything to endanger me or what I love, and it all comes down. I won’t hurt anyone.” She paused. “You know… if we weren’t such opposing roles, I think we could’ve been friends.”

He stared at her hand, unsure what to do. He was helpless unless he stopped her physically right now, but then she could change the world to view him as the bad guy, he…

Took her hand.

Monika smiled.

\--

Monika had promised an open ending, so their world would continue to exist.

She was passing notes in class, happy to open each one and read it before scribbling back on the notes. Sayori was alive, but gone, transferred to another school. Her memorial disappeared like it was never there. There was a feral, helpless animosity between a hero who couldn’t defeat a villain, and a villain getting their way, albeit humbly and kindly. He stopped going to the literature club, finding it all too tempting to reveal her true nature and let the world crumble around them.

Izuku looked over his shoulder at the corkboard at the back of the class.

A picture of a girl hanging herself was right there, in plain daylight. When he blinked, it was gone. He squeezed his pencil so hard it snapped.

He’d better talk to Aizawa-sensei after class.


End file.
